Crete and me.

I have recently returned from another wonderful two weeks on the island of Crete. I ask myself, sometimes, why I always feel so at home on Crete. Why do I feel more 'myself' there than anywhere else? Why does it feel, to use a cliché, as if there is a 'David shaped hole' on Crete that I perfectly fit.?

I have often reflected over this. Is it because, and I exaggerate a little here, that I travel from the cold, clenched, Protestant and regimented north to the warm, open, Orthodox and anarchistic south? That I move from feeling like a wind up toy to feeling like warm honey melting out over the brown and rocky landscape?

Is that too florid? But it captures something of what it feels like..

The climate, of course, is part of it, although I have yet to spend a winter on Crete. But in the spring and summer one can almost guarantee warmth and unbroken sunshine. Of course there are dull days, and very occasionally there is rain, and that can be very heavy. But, the rain doesn't last long, in the summer. Yes, there are days that aren't so good. But usually all one has to consider is the heat, and it can get hot. It can reach 40 degrees C. That is hot! But, on average, the temperature is around 30 degrees, give or take. And the humidity is low, compared to northern Europe, so one does not feel so uncomfortable.

In that sunshine and warmth the weather fades away as an issue. One can do whatever one chooses without having to think about the weather. And life is much more public, as in so many Mediterranean countries. Sitting in a taverna, drinking coffee, and watching the world go by.

And the terrain of Crete is so special. Rocky. Wild. With real mountains that have remote little villages and hidden little valleys, nooks and crannies. A very special atmosphere. It is, of course, cooler in the mountains, and therefore it is greener. The terrain of the lowlands is very brown in the summer. I love the mountains. To see the mighty White Mountains on the horizon gives me a pleasurable chill, an emotional reaction, ever single time I see them.

The wildlife, too, is fascinating. There are, of course, goats everywhere, but they are not wild. The national animal of Crete is a wild goat, the Kri-Kri. They only exist, now, on three small offshore islands.

But there are birds, my great love. There are eagles, vultures, pelicans, owls, kestrels and many smaller species. As I love raptors it is wonderful for me. To see an eagle soaring in a valley high up in the mountains, that is a very special feeling, for me.

There are no poisonous animals on Crete. There are four species of snake, but I have yet to see one. There is a huge amount of insect life, especially ants, or so it seems sometimes. They fascinate me too. There are several species of scorpion, but the sting of the most deadly of these is no worse than a mosquito bite.

And, of course, cicadas. Some people find their chirping irritating, but I don't. That sound IS Crete for me, in many ways. A dark night, sitting on the terrace, feeling a slight breeze and hearing the song of the cicadas. Lovely.

And the history of Crete, the history. A wonderful, incredible history. It is a history of occupation and resistance, in many ways. I will come on to that.

But first, right back at the beginning, in the misty dawn of time, a civilisation flourished on Crete that was sophisticated culturally and technologically. That civilisation has been called the 'Minoan' civilisation since at least Karl Hoeck used it in 1825, but it is more closely associated with the great archaeologist, and discoverer of Minoan culture, Arthur Evans. He excavated, amongst others, the most famous palace of the Minoan era, Knossos, just south of Heraklion.

Minoan civilisation, and it is not known what they called themselves, was the first fragile stirring, the first 'link in the chain', as it has been called, of the greatest culture the world has ever seen - European.

Knossos.

Minoan Bull

Minoan Axe

Reconstruction of life at Knossos

That grabs me. Here, so long ago, the roots of Europe began to establish themselves.

Then, the Minoan civilisation fell, and natural disasters where a factor in this. The civilisation had faded away by about 1200 BCE and Crete underwent periods of occupation and turbulence.

The Mycenaean Greeks were the first conquerors. There appears to have been a period of aristocratic rule and city states. Crete was conquered by the Romans in 71 BCE, for being on the wrong side in a war, and was grouped with Cyrenaica to become the Roman province of Creta et Cyrenaica, with the capital at Gortyn.

Roman rule slowly segued into Byzantine rule.

The island was dominated by arabs from the 820's, for about 150 years, actually becoming the Emirate of Crete. The Byzantine Empire reconquered the island in 961 and expelled the Arabs.

Anyway, I am rambling on. I love history and I never know when enough is enough.

After the Fourth Crusade in 1204 the Byzantines lost control of Crete to the Venetians. Venice ruled Crete, known as the Kingdom of Candia, from 1212 to 1669 (over 400 years). Candia is the city of Heraklion today.

Candia (Heraklion)

The Venetian influence can be seen in, for example, the town of Chania today. The harbour was Venetian, many of the streets and street names in the Old Town are Venetian, and the remains of the massive fortifications are Venetian.

The Venetian presence fueled a renaissance in art, of which possibly El Greco is the most well known representative today.

However, life was hard for the Cretans under the Venetians. As non-Catholics (Greek Orthodox) they suffered heavy taxes and not many civil rights. I don't know of any rebellions or resistance by the Cretans during this period, but I cannot imagine that there were none at all.

Then, in 1669, after a 21 years long siege, Candia fell to the Ottoman Turks and Crete became a part of the Ottoman Empire for 200 years. Mainland Greece successfully rebelled against the Ottomans starting in 1821, and Crete followed suit with the Cretan Revolt of 1866 to 1869, finally overthrowing the Ottomans.

The mosque in Chania.

Crete was an independent state until 1908 when they voted for unification with the mainland of Greece.

The  200 year long muslim presence is not visible in Crete today. In Chania the mosque is now an exhibition centre. Of course, in 1923 the Greeks and the Turks exchanged populations. Orthodox Greeks in Turkey, who had been suffering persecution and had begun to flee, were swapped with Muslims living in Greece. This meant that Greece did not have, and does not have, a Muslim population as such to this day.

During the period of Ottoman occupation there were several attempts at rebellion and continual resistance by the Cretans. This is a fascinating and detailed story in its own right, but I will leave it there. The greatest epic of Cretan resistance was, of course, during the German occupation from May 1941 to the end of the war. Under the occupation Greece as a whole suffered more than any other occupied country except for Poland, and their resistance was one of most effective in Europe.

I appear to have rambled on anyway. But the point of this, besides outline what fascinates me about Crete, is to look at the culture and the people of the island. This landscape, this climate, and this history has shaped both the culture and the people of this place.

Yes, I love the food here. Nothing can beat fresh Cretan oranges or fresh tomatoes for example. And the olive oil is second to none. I love the music, too, the traditional Cretan music and dance. This does carry a trace of arabic/ottoman influence.

But, it is the people that truly make a place. It is people that truly matter. And the people of Crete are ... well, they are magnificent.

The Cretans are Cretans first, and Greeks second. They are very proud, and very independent. For a 100 generations and more they have resisted central authority, and they still do. They are anarchistic. The most important social unit is the family, and the village. The extended family and the village are often the same thing anyway. They are open, and extremely generous. They love life and they enjoy life. But, despite the myths, they also work very, very hard. They work hard to extract an existence from the world they inhabit, and they play very hard too.

However, I have never seen a Cretan drunk. Yes, they drink alcohol in pretty impressive amount sometimes, but they dance, and they drink a lot of water at the same time. Maybe that's why?

The pace of life is slow, and when a Cretan says they will come on Saturday, for example, you aren't sure which Saturday they mean.
  
Some people we know went to a Cretan wedding. There were over 1,000 guests and they provided, between them, all the food and drink. There were also a group of young men from the mountain villages, all dressed in traditional Cretan clothing. And, of course, firearms were discharged. At any major event guns are fired into the air.

Up in the mountains you can see where road signs have been used, a lot, for target practice. It is said that there are more weapons on the island than people. A lot were left after World War 2 was over of course, and disappeared into people's homes.

In the remoter villages it can feel as if one has gone back in time by about 100 years, as if there really is no connection with the modern world. That is, until a young man pulls out his iPhone of course.

The people of Crete ... I love them. Funny, proud, independent, fiercely loyal to family, open and hospitable ... anarchistic. 

In the final analysis, although everything else I have said is true, I think it is the people and their culture that suits my own personal outlook and views more than anything else.

And, I must include this. A wonderful, wonderful clip:

"It is better to die on your feet than to live on your knees." Emiliano Zapata

I am tired of this, really tired. And I cannot understand the apparently endless patience of my fellow countrymen and women. This ideology kills. This ideology poisons all that is good and positive about our culture. This ideology, the creation of a vicious barbaric warlord, is spreading like syphilis in a port town. It, obviously, must be dealt with, and dealt with directly, and soon. 

Or else all will be lost.

Our elites still refuse to confront the reality of the situation, that Islam is not compatible with any form of civilised life or culture and must be pushed back into the hell holes it comes from.

Or we will find ourselves living in such a hell hole.

Where is the spirit, the motivation, that lead our young men into the fight against what was at the time the worst evil the world had seen - Nazism? What would they think if they came back today and could see our civilisation being picked slowly to pieces by an alien ideology and, what is more, apparently aided and abetted by our own elites, our own politicians and our own, new, version of fascism - Social Justice-ism?

Surely, surely to god, it is better to die standing up, as Emiliano said?

Where is the fight going to come from? Where are the new Crusaders when we need them, ready to fight an apocalyptic crusade?

I am so tired of this.

I am tired of the lies and distortions spread by Islam and its fellow travellers. The lie of the Crusades. The lies about Muhammad. The lies about the content of the ideology itself.

Don't we know enough now, to act? Haven't we experienced enough, now, to see straight through the smokescreens and the 'explanations' and the justifications and the lies? Where is a Churchill when you need him?

I am 64 years old, and would die within seconds in a fight. But I would rather that than live in a 7th Century hell hole.

But it is for our descendants we must fight. What will they think of our failure? What will they think when our legacy to them is a primitive and barbaric culture?

Maybe I am too pessimistic. I know that there are people bravely standing up to be counted. But what happens to them? Vilified. Mocked. Banned. Arrested. We are already living in a society that is the advance guard of an Islamic state.

There is a huge, smelly, fæces encrusted elephant in the room, and those who are pointing it out get attacked.

Fight, or bend the knee - which is it to be?

Si vis pacem, para bellum

¤

Carthago delenda est

Manchester 2017

I am angry. I am furious. I am boiling. Another Islamist attack. Another group of people whose lives are taken, or shattered forever for the sake of a primitive, medieval death cult.

Enough is, surely, enough?

Despite my boiling rage I think that it is very important that we react with cold reason and hard logic. In an act of fury we are no better than the monster who took the lives of concert goers in Manchester.

Europe has allowed an utterly alien fascist ideological movement to settle in the nooks and crannies of their various social groups. From there Europe has allowed the poisonous ideology to spread via radical Mosques and appeasement from our politicians, cheer led by our so-called 'progressive' elites. The ancient and varied cultures of Europe are being rapidly undermined by Islamofascism. The fruits of the greatest civilisation and culture ever to grace this planet, and I mean Western Enlightenment civilisation, are being destroyed by this ideology.

But the blame lies with, as I said above, our mealy mouthed and weak politicians and with the equally wicked form of fascism generally known as 'progressivism' or 'Social Justice-ism'.

How long are we going to stand for this?

Now, in my homeland, we have soldiers on the streets and a heightened security state. And the powers that be say 'Carry on as normal'. How the hell is that 'normal?????

We have allowed this to happen, by being afraid of being labelled 'racist' or 'islamophobic'. Once again, Islam is not a race, and to be afraid of Islam is not irrational, it is a perfectly rational fear based on long and painful experience.

I think, maybe, that people will begin to take retaliatory measure on their own, and that is understandable. The fear with that is that all remnants of the rule of law will collapse, and that can only hasten the collapse of Western Civilisation. It will also allow a wide variety of other groups, equally as frightening as Islamofascism, to emerge from the undergrowth. It will open the doors to vigilantism, vendettas and criminal activity.

So, what can we do?

We can continue to speak out, unafraid of smear attacks, and we can begin to organise in larger and larger groups who have had enough, and say so loudly.

I still fear that it won't be enough, that Western civilisation is losing this war, and it is a war, and that some form of civil war will erupt. And that will be so destructive of the very elements of Western civilisation that have made it great - liberty, reason, the rule of law, freedom of speech, economic freedom, the individual's pursuit of their own happiness, science and progress.

What do we do???????

I am angry and so very frustrated.

What do we do? It cannot go on like this.

Si vis pacem, para bellum

¤

Carthago delenda est

We are at war.

We are at war. We are at war with some very, very powerful currents in contemporary societies and culture.

I have attempted several times to write the piece that I am starting here. I am a little unclear, actually, about what it is I want to say because there are so many things that I want to try and put into words. I live, at the age of 64 years, a very comfortable life with no huge problems. I will admit that and I am very grateful for the life I have had, and continue to enjoy. But I see so many things going on these days that worry me very, very much. Not for me, but for the generations to come. I fear that the human species is on the verge of reverting to the mean of human existence, and that mean is, as Hobbes so famously put it, “… solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short.”

For 99% of the history of our species life has been very, very harsh indeed. Even for those few who managed to enjoy a slightly better life, it was tough by the standards we have become accustomed to today. That is the mean of human existence, the norm if you like. For about 200 years our species has lifted itself well above that mean. Starting in England, spreading to Europe, slowly at first, the standard of living for homo sapiens got better, and better and better, and began to spread around the world.

At first it was not believed. There had been upturns and downturns throughout human history, and people expected this was just a good, long, upturn. They expected the downturn to come. But it didn’t. Life got better, eventually at an exponential rate.

Maybe the downturn is coming? And if it does, it is going to be truly awful.

What were the factors, in my opinion, that lifted humanity out of its harsh existence and sent us to the stars? I would argue for four things:

Liberty, Capitalism, Industrialisation and Science.

Each of these has a complex history and interact in multi faceted ways. To explore those histories and those ways would be interesting, but I am not going to do that here. Some people would include Democracy in that list, but I choose not to. The reason that I exclude Democracy is because the true explosion that gave us the Modern World was well under way before Democracy was a reality in the West. Democracy itself is an interesting and problematic concept and I may well come back to that at another time.

These four cornerstones of our modern luxurious life are under serious attack today. The attack comes from several directions, but it can all be summed up in one word – Ideology.

By ideology I mean a system of ideas that already knows all the answers and that just requires faith from its followers. Religion is the classic form of what I mean, the ideal type of ideology, but it can also be found in political, social and cultural belief systems.

The most dangerous and violent form of ideological belief that exists today is, I think, Islamic Fascism. This is both a real physical threat and an insidious acid eating away at Western culture from the inside. It is a poison to Enlightenment values and it must be stopped. I fear that it may be too late.

Then we have a whole cluster of related ideologies that go by the general label these days of Social Justice. This has many dimensions, from fourth wave feminism to Global Warmism to Eco Fascism. All of these, in their various ways, are undermining the same Enlightenment values that Islamism attacks. In that sense they are allies.

Liberty is under massive attack, as the range of things that we can do and say gets reduced and reduced, both by Social Justice Fascism and Islamic Fascism.

Capitalism is under attack as SJ Fascism undermines the liberty required for it to function and drains more and more resources away from the market and into an ever growing state.

Industrialisation has become a dirty word.

And even Science is under pressure, both from within and without. Within the scientific community the malign influence of politics linked to ideological agendas and funding has had a very distorting effect. And from without we have seen the denial of many scientific claims purely because they do not fit a specific ideological discourse.

This is a very brief description of what I think is happening. Various forms of ideological fascism are eating away at the foundations of our material and cultural way of life. If a crash comes, and we begin to revert to the mean of human existence, it will be nasty and brutish.

As I said, we are at war with totalitarian and fascistic ideologies. I hope that war can still be won, but I have my doubts.

Sic Transit Gloria Mundi

The year of Our Lord two thousand and sixteen  is almost over. Another year soon will be receding into the past and all the joys and pains that came with it will rapidly fade in our memories. All the things that were so important, so urgent, will become distant shadows as new, and equally illusory, issues take up our time and energy.

There will be many, many retrospectives of this year on the media in the coming days, so I won't waste too much time on it. I think that 2016 has been a pretty good year. Oh, there are still some very serious problems to solve, such as fascism in its Islamic and Left wing varieties. They are still very much with us unfortunately. There have been, maybe, some slight signs of a distant glimmer of hope in relation to those two pernicious evils. Maybe.

The great news of the year was Brexit, and then the American Presidential election of course.

I could not vote in the British Referendum because I have not lived in the UK for more than 15 years now. I would, of course, have voted to leave if I could have done. The margin of victory was a bit slim, but a majority it nevertheless was. Excellent. I have indicated elsewhere why I think the vote was so important and so positive. I just wish that they would get on with it!

The American election was also a very positive result. I have no great love for either of the final two candidates, but I was very pleased when Clinton didn't make it. She is a corrupt, criminal, ineffective, ignorant and arrogant representative of all that is so very wrong with the West's political culture. I wish Trump well, but I expect he will have a hard time of it, and by the time the 2020 election rolls around people will be tired of him, too. I just hope that Mrs. Obama doesn't stand in 2020. I don't think that the US, or the world, could cope with another dose of Barry-ism.

What was interesting was the reaction of the losers in both of these cases and what that might mean for democracy. In both Brexit and the US elections the losers had a child like temper tantrum. Like a 5 year old who doesn't win the game, they stamped their little feet and cried because they lost. They wanted to change the rules of the game until they got a result that they liked.

Now democracy is a pretty crappy system, but it is better than all the others that have been tried by the human race. Given that we have to have a state of some kind (as small as possible!) then surely it is vital that those over whom it has power have some say over how it is governed. Democracy at least tries to translate the 'Will of the People' into actual governance. The problems that it throws up are, for example:

1.  WHO are 'The People' - who has a say? Why?
2.  WHAT does it mean to say 'The Will' of the people?
3.  HOW can we measure that 'Will'?
4.  By what mechanism can we turn that measurement into actual policies?

Given that all practical means to answer these questions are pragmatic compromises one has to accept the system that results from that process if one wants to play the game. Fair enough, after the game is over debate and discuss the nature of the system, but while the game is being played one must accept the rules as they exist. I doubt if there would have been a peep from the losing groups if they had, in fact, won.

The US system is interesting and I now understand much better the Electoral College system and I think that it is, in fact, a practical solution to the problem of Federal level democracy in the USA. Given that each State of the Union is, in principle, an independent state there has to be some way of ensuring that all the States have a fair shot. Without the Electoral College system 2 or 3 States would dominate every Presidential election.

Anyway, those events make 2016 a particularly good year I think.

Another positive development in 2016 was the dramatic decline in poverty at the global level.

As a result of increasing economic freedom and allowing enterprise to flourish huge numbers of individuals have now been lifted, or lifted themselves, out of poverty. There is still too much poverty, of course, but the trend is strongly in the right direction.

There have been many, many good and positive things that happened in 2016. One can Google it and find endless web pages listing big and small things that were good.

So, not a bad year at all.

Personally, I have had a good year. Alright, I ended the year in the depths of depression, but that is beginning to lift again. I am happily in love with my wonderful wife, Tove, who has been there for me all year. We have a cozy little house that we love. We have enough to eat and a roof over our heads. Money may be tight, but we are fabulously wealthy in so many ways.

_________________________________________________________________________

Now - the obligatory list of deaths in 2016. These are the people whose death this year affected me to a greater or lesser extent:

January 10th: David Bowie died at the age of 69. I always liked his music, some more than others.

January 14th: Alan Rickman died at the age of 69. A very good actor.

January 24th: Marvin Minsky died at the age of 88. A groundbreaking cognitive scientist.

January 31st: Terry Wogan died at the age of 77. He was just always a part of everyday life on the radio and on TV for many years.

February 19th: Umberto Eco died at the age of 84. A wonderful writer. Both The Name of the Rose and Foucault's Pendulum are excellent.

March 11th: Keith Emerson committed suicide at the age of 71. A major part of the development of my musical taste. A wonderful keyboard player. I saw him live, once, as a part of Emerson, Lake and Palmer in the early 70's. Tarkus had just been released.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yg2KjxNtAiM

April 17th: Doris Roberts died at the age of 90. Wonderful actress and I loved her in Everybody Loves Raymond.

June 3rd: Muhammed Ali died at the age of 74. Best boxer ever!

July 27th: Jerry Doyle died at the age of 60. Loved him in Babylon 5.

August 29th: Gene Wilder died at the age of 83. Just a wonderful, and very funny, actor.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w1FLZPFI3jc

November  7th: Leonard Cohen died at the age of 82. Just a wonderful, wonderful musician, songwriter and performer. Has had a lasting, and deep, effect on me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6wRYjtvIYK0

November 11th: Robert Vaughn died at the age of 83. Alway and forever the Man from Uncle.

November 23rd: Andrew Sachs died at the age of 86. He comes from Barcelona you know.

December 7th: Greg Lake died at the age of 69. Again, a key part of my musical development. Saw him live, once, at the same gig when I saw Emerson way back in the 70's.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5AXxQGai4JU

December 8th: John Glenn died at the age of 95. A hero from my young days as I followed the American space programme with a passion.

December 24th: Richard Adams died at the age of 96. He wrote that wonderful book Watership Down.

December 27th: Carrie Fisher died at the age of 60. Always and forever Princess Leia.

I wish you all a wonderful New Year and a Peaceful 2017.

Presidential thoughts.

I realise that in the wake of the recent Presidential election in the USA, there has been an awful lot of writing, commenting, discussion and so on. I am a little hesitant to add to that pile, as in a few months it will probably all be forgotten. However, I just want to make my feelings clear, for anyone who may be interested.

Firstly, I am very, very happy that Clinton lost the election. She is a corrupt and criminal individual who must never be allowed near power.

The media around this election has been a disgrace, an absolute disgrace. They built up a very specific narrative, based on no evidence, that Trump was a fascist clown and that Clinton was almost a goddess. No questions were ever put to Clinton about the heap of evidence that reveals her rottenness, and yet any small thing that could cast Trump in a bad light, no matter how old, or how minor, was blown up out of all proportion.

I don’t, particularly, have any great hope in Trump. On the whole I regard politicians as a necessary irritation, best avoided. And I seriously think that Trump will find the realities of formal political power daunting.

However, I am still pleased that he won, and not Clinton.

Like Brexit (which I would have voted for, but could not as I have not lived in the UK for more than 15 years) this was an expression of the wishes and hopes and frustrations of perfectly decent, ordinary, people who have just had enough of being ignored, talked down, and treated with contempt

The ordinary everyday people who run the shops, work in the factories, clean up the trash, make sure that the electricity and water systems work and so on, have had enough. The have had enough of identity politics and the relentless focus on ethnicity, gender and religious belief that splits and divides people into smaller and smaller groups that then argue about who is most privileged and who is most oppressed. They are tired of the new forms of racism and sexism produced by their so-called betters. You’d better not be white, and god knows don’t be male!!!!!!!!

They are tired of the way in which every damn thing becomes an argument about race, or gender, or ethnicity or whatever, that continually splits people into groups.

They have had enough of cultural relativism and mass immigration. Yes, they feel that their way of life is threatened and, by god, looking around the mess that is Europe now who can blame them?

These ordinary people who get up, go to work, save up, buy a house, raise a family under conditions of increasing economic pressure and social uncertainty, of course they are frustrated and angry.

They cannot trust their politicians any more, they cannot trust the media any more, they cannot even trust the education system any more and when one looks at the bizarre antics of so called cultured people and what is actually taught these days again, who can blame them?

And thank god it is Trump. The cultural warriors of the left have created a situation open to exploitation by some really frightening political movements.

This is in danger of turning into a formless rant so I will wind up. Other people, good people, have said all this and said it better than I have.

The ordinary people have spoken, they have spoken for freedom from the continuous micro management of their lives by intellectual idiots. And for that, I am very, very grateful.